Nothing But Possibility
by starbuckmeggie
Summary: Tom and B'Elanna, a brief moment of repose, considering the future. *there are no spoilers because the show has been off the air for 16 years. If you haven't seen it, I can't help you*


I sigh contentedly and nestle against Tom—my _husband_! We actually got married. All these years together and we finally got married. I didn't realize just how much I wanted it until we said, "I do."

His arms tighten around me, pulling the thin blanket a little higher against my chest. I can feel his heart thumping insistently against my back, the tempo still erratic. His skin is still damp, clammy from our exertions, and it's one of my favorite feelings in the world. I gaze dreamily out the viewport, post-coital bliss making me lethargic—we never even made it out of the cockpit. We've always been very adventurous in our sex life, but sex in the pilot seat of the Delta Flyer, or any shuttle for that matter, is definitely a first. I get the feeling that this isn't what Captain Janeway had in mind when she let us use the Flyer for our honeymoon.

I have to stop myself from chuckling. Hopefully, she didn't have _anything_ in mind about our honeymoon. Still, we'll have to sterilize the whole area before we let anyone else near it.

Tom kisses my neck tenderly and I sigh again. I slide my hand across his, our new wedding bands knocking together gently. The rings gleam softly, the lights of the control panels and stars reflecting off the shiny gold. It was a little old-fashioned, and technically against Starfleet regulations, but since it was the Captain's idea, and I knew I wanted a ring the moment she mentioned it, I don't think she'll note it in our official records.

I think Captain Janeway was just a little happy for us when we told her we wanted to get married. Ours might have been the first ceremony she's ever performed.

Tom's lips move up my neck to my jaw and I turn my head, smiling as our mouths meet in a soft kiss. One of his hands moves under the blanket, sliding across my bare stomach to my back. His touch is gentle, but full of promise. I can feel the way that he's pressed against my leg that he's nowhere near ready for another round, but I'm not worried. We have time.

"We should have a baby," he whispers against my lips.

My eyes fly open. I pull my head back in shock. "What?"

He smiles at me hazily, his fingers still stroking my back. "We should have a baby."

My mouth drops open. I don't even know how to process that. "What?" I ask again, dumbly.

His eyes twinkle mischievously, but I don't know if it's because of my reaction or if he's teasing me about having a child. "A baby, B'Elanna. You know what those are, don't you?"

"Tom," I warn him half-heartedly as I try to sit up, but he holds me tightly to him, not letting me escape. He waits for me to say something, smiling at me gently, but I still have no idea what to do with the suggestion. Finally, all I can do is shrug helplessly.

"Don't you want a baby?" he asks, his tone taking on a more serious edge.

My head swirls. This is _not_ a conversation I expected to have tonight. "We've only been married for a couple of hours," I finally manage to croak out.

"What does that have to do with anything? We've been together for three years. A lot of people who aren't married have kids. A lot of people who've been together for less time have kids. I think we're in pretty good shape for it."

"Other than the whole lost-in-space, living-on-a-starship thing," I counter, rolling my eyes.

"Okay, so maybe it's not the most ideal," he concedes, kissing my shoulder. "But we have to keep living our life, B'Elanna. We don't know if we'll ever get back to the Alpha Quadrant. That doesn't mean we shouldn't try to have it all, right?"

Those excuses are thin and I know it. Both Tom and myself have been extraordinarily happy to live our lives out in the middle of the nowhere, separately and together. The Delta Quadrant wound up being a fresh start for so many of us, and he's absolutely right that there's no reason we shouldn't try to live life to the fullest. But still…

"Where is this coming from?" I finally manage to ask, my head still reeling just from the mention of it.

He sighs and rests his chin on my shoulder, but says nothing. His fingers continue to gently caress my skin, and I try to control my heart as it attempts to pound out of control. What the hell is he thinking about? A _baby_? I haven't had time to get used to us being married yet, I don't know if I can wrap my mind around being parents.

"It hasn't even been twenty-four hours since I almost lost you because you thought _I_ thought that all I wanted was 'interesting.'"

I purse my lips in exasperation, but don't try to pull away from him this time. "Tom, that _was_ all you wanted."

"No, I was happy with it, but that doesn't mean I proposed to you on a whim."

"Oh, come on."

"Would you listen to me for a minute?" It takes everything I have in me to not elbow him in the solar plexus, but I remain silent. "I've been thinking about marrying you for at least a year and a half by now. Probably longer, really, but the idea has crossed my mind a lot more frequently lately. Sometimes, at least at first, it was just quick flashes of the thought, then I'd force it out of my head, but it's been harder to forget lately. After you and Harry went missing a few months ago, I almost proposed to you the moment you got back on board, but I figured you'd either just laugh at me or turn around and go back to that planet"

He's really been thinking about this for that long? "Well, why didn't you say something to me?"

"Tough Klingon exterior, remember?" I let out a huff of frustrated air and turn so that I'm sideways on his lap. He smiles at me and tucks a lock of still damp hair behind my ear before gripping the edge of the blanket and tightening it around the both of us. "You're not always easy to talk to, B'Elanna. You do a really good job of letting me know when you don't want to talk, actually." I would ask for some sort of example, but I don't think we have that kind of time. Suffice it to say, he's not wrong. "Honestly, as long as you weren't breaking up with me, I've been pretty content to just go with it. When you want to talk, you do, and I love to hear what you have to say, but other than that…well, sometimes I think it'd be easier to make Tuvok smile."

That actually does bring a smile to my lips. "You…might have a small point."

"But none of that means that I haven't thought about spending the rest of my life with you. I sure as hell didn't want to push you, and it's not like you ever said anything that sounded like forever."

"Did I ever say anything that sounded like we were temporary?"

A look of frustration passes over his face. "I don't want to play these games, B'Elanna."

"I'm not trying to play any game, I just want to know. Did I ever make you think that you weren't a permanent fixture in my life?"

He pauses, taking his time to really think about it. "No, I guess you haven't."

"Okay, but in my defense, you've always tossed me aside for whatever your latest obsession happens to be." He opens his mouth to interrupt me, but I barrel through. "Fair Haven. Captain Proton. Alice. Race cars. Skiing. Parasailing. Every single time, Tom. There's always something that else that's more important."

He looks ashamed, but at least he doesn't try to deny it. "I know. I can be…oblivious at times. I'm sorry about that, and I promise you I'll try harder to be better to you. You're my whole world, B'Elanna. You have to know that. None of that stuff means anything without you. When I start to go off on a tangent, you've got to let me know. I'm like a puppy and we all know it. Just reel me back in."

I tilt my head, studying his earnest expression. "You've really wanted to marry me for a while now?"

He leans forward and kisses me softly, resting his forehead against my mine for a moment. "I knew a long time ago that pursuing you meant forever. I never intended to just dump you when being together lost the thrill of a new relationship. I knew that unless we got together and wound up being wildly incompatible, I was in it for the long haul. I guess I was just taking my cues from you. I had no idea that you weren't happy with the status quo."

"Obviously," I answer, thinking back to his complete bewilderment when I told him our relationship needed help. "I guess if this marriage is going to work, we're going to have to start really talking to each other. You can't avoid talking to me because you think I don't want to talk, and I have to start telling you when things are bothering me."

He nods, smiling. "You're absolutely right. Know what else is going to make our marriage work?"

I wiggle a little closer to him, liking where this is going. "What's that?"

"Not letting you think you've managed to avoid talking about something."

"What?"

"A baby, B'Elanna."

And just like that, the topic that started this conversation comes rushing back to me. I'd somehow managed to actually forget it for a few moments. "Why is it so important all of a sudden that we have a baby?"

"It's not important that we have a baby now," he answers, tightening his arms around me before I have a chance to try to bolt. "It's important that we talk about the possibility of someday now, though. I'm not going through the absolute terror of just the thought of losing you again just because we haven't bothered to have an important conversation. You don't have to want a baby now, but I need you to know that it's on the table. It's something we can talk about whenever you're ready."

Ready. Right. Like I'll ever be ready to really think about having a child. True, it's something I've considered in the vaguest of ways over the last few years, but how do I tell him that?

Well, I guess I could start by being honest with him. Considering we _just_ had a conversation about it being important that we talk to each other instead of just making assumptions, this is probably an already pivotal moment in our brief marriage.

"It's…it's crossed my mind a couple of times over the years," I finally confess. I'll be damned if it doesn't actually feel good. "Nothing serious, but I've thought about it a little."

His eyes widen in surprise, but his face lights up with a large, toothy grin. "Does that mean you want a baby?"

I open my mouth to answer, but nothing comes out. I feel my heart pounding against my ribcage. It's a genuinely scary question. "I…I…I don't really know. Do _you_ want a baby?" He hesitates and I shake my head at him. "Tell me the truth." Whatever that happens to be.

He looks away from me, something he's always done to distance himself from a moment, even if for just a few seconds. When his eyes finally meet mine again, his expression is hard to read. "Yeah. Yeah, I do."

I swear that my heart actually stops. "You do?" I whisper, unable to say anything else.

"I do. I want us to have a family."

Maybe it's because of everything that's happened in the last couple of days, or maybe I've finally spent too much time around my sentimental husband, but I feel a tear well up in my eye and slide down my cheek before I can stop myself. I don't know what it is—maybe I just needed to hear him say it first. Maybe hearing him say it made me realize what I want. "I do, too."

A laugh of pure joy bursts out of him and he pulls me in for a tight hug. "Really?"

"Yeah," I answer as I hug him back, shock coursing through my body. I actually want kids? Me? I make myself think about it again, wondering if I only said yes because that's what Tom said, but it doesn't take me long to realize it's true. I _do_ want children. I want them with Tom.

"It's not going to be easy, you know," I tell him, pulling back a little. He nods, but I just shake my head. "I don't even mean raising a kid on a place like _Voyager_ , though I think we both know that's going to be…tricky. The odds against human/Klingon conception are—"

"High," he finishes for me. "Really, ridiculously high." I tilt my head at him, confused, but he just smiles at me. "I've thought about this, too, B'Elanna. I've done my research. I know what we're up against."

"It could take us years. It took my parents six years before I came along."

His face blanches a little at that. I'm sure he probably figured it'd be a year or so before we could conceive, not the better part of a decade, but if we're going to do this, he has to know what we're in for. A few moments later, though, his expression clears and he smiles again, tightening his grip on me. "Maybe it'll be easier for us since you're half-human."

"Tom…"

"And maybe it won't," he concedes. "But we'll be in it together, right? And any time we get frustrated with the whole process, we'll remember to talk each other. Right?"

I take a deep breath and nod, the enormity of what we're talking about doing not quite hitting me yet. "Definitely. We're in this together." This is insane. Yesterday, we weren't even married and now we're talking about starting a family. I would say that we're rushing into it, but we've been together for three years. Closer to four, if I want to count the almost entire year he chased after me and we sort of dated but not really publicly. This really could take years, too. There's no point in waiting for us to have been married for a few years so that we can be "ready" for a family, only to have to wait another few years to maybe get pregnant. If we start trying sooner rather than later, maybe we'll be surprised. "When do you want to start trying?"

He waggles his eyebrows at me. "We could try now. I work with the Doc, so I have a few authorizations and overrides. I can deactivate our contraceptives in seconds."

I bite my lip, really thinking about it for a few moments before I shake my head. "No. No, let's wait until we get back to the ship. We'll talk to the Doctor and we'll make sure everything's okay and then we'll start trying. Besides, this is our honeymoon and our first chance to be alone in months. Let's just enjoy this. Okay?"

He nods without hesitation. "You're right. We'll do it on the up and up when we get back. I'm sure the Doc'll be thrilled when he finds out what we're doing." He leans forward and kisses my neck, amazing me once again how he's able to shift gears—a figure of speech I learned from him, naturally—so quickly. "This'll just be a dry run for us."

"Dry?" I ask suggestively, my voice suddenly an octave lower than normal. Part of me wishes that after all this time together, having my neck kissed by Tom didn't still have this effect on me.

His teeth scrape my skin and I shudder.

Then again, what would be the fun of that?

His hand slips between my thighs, stroking me gently. I gasp and jump, laughing a little in surprise. His eyes twinkle as he gives me a small, smug smile. "Maybe not that dry," he murmurs.

"You're such an ass," I answer as I twist in his arms, moving to straddle his thighs. Our lips meet in an unhurried kiss as the blanket we'd been using finally falls away. His fingers stroke up and down my skin as we move against each other softly. Most of the time, the build up to sex is almost as much fun as the act itself, and this feels like no exception.

In a couple of days we'll be back on the ship and back to our lives, and we'll actually be trying to make a baby. For now, though, it's just the two of us—Tom and B'Elanna Paris or B'Elanna and Tom Torres—with nothing but possibility in ahead of us.

* * *

A/N…So, more head canon. I feel like, in order for Tom to keep up with B'Elanna, the Doctor would have devised some sort of natural stamina recovering hypospray, but would have restricted use to once a day. For their honeymoon, however, they'd have unrestricted access to said hypo, so that they may do with their lives what they will. I don't know why I developed this theory, but now it's there.

Also, I believe Neelix would have organized a reception for them when they got back. I could imagine him being very put out that he wasn't able to throw a lavish wedding ceremony for them, but would have been content with organizing a party for after. I also think that they would have loved it, and celebrating with their friends around them would have made them really happy.

And finally, I like to believe that Miral's middle name was Kathryn. I really, really hope it was because that would have been the sweetest gesture in the world.

I wrote this months ago and promptly forgot about it. At least, couldn't remember it long enough to get it posted. Too much going on. I'm in the process of writing I think three other fics in this genre right now, too, so maybe one of those will be finished before I die.


End file.
